Today in one sentence: Biden holds a 253 to 213 Electoral College advantage over Trump after narrowly winning both Wisconsin and Michigan; the Trump campaign, however, said it would request a recount; Biden holds a lead in Arizona and Nevada, while Trump is up in Alaska, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Georgia; Democrats are still projected to win the House but in the Senate, Democrats have only gained one seat, with five races yet to be called; Biden is currently winning the popular vote by nearly 3 million; and Trump falsely claimed he won the presidential election and vowed to take legal action to stop "all voting."

Today in one sentence: Biden holds a 253 to 213 Electoral College advantage over Trump after narrowly winning both Wisconsin and Michigan; the Trump campaign, however, said it would request a recount; Biden holds a lead in Arizona and Nevada, while Trump is up in Alaska, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Georgia; Democrats are still projected to win the House but in the Senate, Democrats have only gained one seat, with five races yet to be called; Biden is currently winning the popular vote by nearly 3 million; and Trump falsely claimed he won the presidential election and vowed to take legal action to stop “all voting.”

1/ With millions of votes yet to be counted, Trump falsely asserted there was election fraud, demanded that “all voting must stop,” threatened to have the Supreme Court intervene in the election process, and declared himself the winner of the election, which will take days – if not weeks – to resolve. In a 2:30 a.m. address from the White House and surrounded by about 150 mask-less guests, Trump peddled multiple baseless claims that the normal process of counting ballots – which has been slowed by the impact of COVID-19 pandemic – is an “embarrassment” and a “fraud on the American public.” Trump also claimed victory in several states where millions of mail-in ballots are still being counted, describing the situation as a “major fraud in our nation,” and without offering any explanation, said “we’ll be going to the U.S. Supreme Court. We want all voting to stop.” Voting did stop when polls closed Tuesday night, but in several states counting of mail-in ballots couldn’t begin until Election Day, which are expected to take several days to complete. And, earlier in the night, Trump baselessly tweeted that “We are up BIG, but they are trying to STEAL the Election. We will never let them do it. Votes cannot be cast after the Polls are closed.” Twitter flagged the tweet as disputed and possibly misleading. There is no evidence to support any of Trump’s claims. On Wednesday, Biden said it was “clear” that he would reach 270 electoral votes and win the presidency, but stopped short of claiming victory. “Here, the people rule,” Biden said. “Power can’t be taken or asserted. It flows from the people. And it’s their will that determines who will be the president of the United States, and their will alone,” adding: “every vote must be counted. No one’s going to take our democracy away from us. Not now, not ever.” (The Guardian / New York Times / CNN / Washington Post / Wall Street Journal / New York Times / BuzzFeed News)

2/ Biden narrowly won both Wisconsin and Michigan. The Trump campaign, meanwhile, vowed to “immediately” request a recount in Wisconsin, which can be done if the margin of victory is within 1%. According to the current count, Biden leads by less than 21,000 votes or roughly 0.6 percentage points. Trump campaign manager Bill Stepien said in a statement that Trump “is well within the threshold to request a recount” in Wisconsin, and that the campaign planned to “immediately do so.” Trump’s campaign also filed lawsuits in Pennsylvania and Michigan to halt ballot counting, arguing that they were not given “meaningful access” to monitor the opening of ballots and the counting process. The Trump campaign also is seeking to intervene in a Pennsylvania case at the Supreme Court that deals with whether ballots received up to three days after the election can be counted. (NPR / Politico / CNN / The Guardian / Associated Press / NBC News / CNBC)

3/ Senate control rests on five uncalled races. Democratic prospects of taking control of the Senate were diminished after Republican incumbents, including Joni Ernst in Iowa, Steve Daines in Montana, and Susan Collins in Maine, all fended off challengers. Republicans hold a 53-47 advantage in the Senate and Democrats need to flip four seats to take the majority if Trump is re-elected – or three if Biden wins. Democrats have gained one seat. (Wall Street Journal / Bloomberg / CNN / Axios)

4/ The U.S. Postal Service failed to comply with a federal judge’s order to sweep 12 postal processing facilities that cover 15 states for undelivered mail-in ballots on Election Day. Earlier Tuesday, Judge Emmet Sullivan ordered the Postal Service to search facilities after the agency said that some 300,000 ballots it had received had not been scanned for delivery. The judge gave USPS until 3 p.m. to complete the sweeps, but the agency rebuffed the order, saying it would stick to its own schedule. Nearly 7% of ballots in USPS sorting facilities on Tuesday were not processed on time for submission to election officials. On Wednesday, Sullivan threatened to call Postmaster General Louis DeJoy to appear before him, saying “I’m not pleased about this 11th-hour development last night. Someone may have a price to pay for that.” (Washington Post / New York Times / Bloomberg / Wall Street Journal / CNBC)

5/ The United States formally left the Paris climate agreement, a global pact forged five years ago to avert catastrophic climate change. The Trump formally notified the United Nations a year ago that the U.S. would withdraw from the agreement. Nearly 200 nations remain committed to the 2015 agreement, which aims to keep the increase in average temperatures worldwide “well below” 2 degrees Celsius. (Associated Press / NBC News / Scientific American / Axios)

Last year today: Day 1019: Threatened.